


stay with me, my tamed wolf, til morning comes and drives away the moon

by deathrae



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Dreamwalking, F/M, Ugh, adventures in iambic pentameter, i am deep in solavellan hell and I'm not sure I know the way back out, lord save me from myself, more dreamwalking solas
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-28
Updated: 2015-10-28
Packaged: 2018-04-28 14:15:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,066
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5093759
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deathrae/pseuds/deathrae
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She calls from deep in the snarl of a nightmare, despite wall or hall or even his own rest... and like a dog to the call of his master, he goes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	stay with me, my tamed wolf, til morning comes and drives away the moon

She tossed and rolled, murmuring half-formed phrases in mixed Common and Elvish that burned at his soul as he stood beside her bed, his ears twitching trying to follow her scattered thoughts. He wasn’t sure how to explain what had drawn him to her quarters in the middle of the night, waking him from his own contented sleep, but now that he was here, he could venture to guess. Her good hand was tangled in the loose sheet of her pillow, the marked one flitting anxiously from the blanket to her bedclothes to the edge of the bed, clutching each in turn as she thrashed back and forth.

He dropped to one knee, studying her face. Her expression, so often wry and smiling and in seemingly perpetual good humor in daylight, was tortured now, her brow furrowed and her eyes clenched shut. Her hair, which was just long enough that she tended to tie it back when she was working, was loose and fell around her face in a wild, frantic tangle.

Her mouth was curled into a frown that seemed etched into her face, leaving deep lines and creases that he wanted desperately to replace with her usual smile. In a moment of boldness, he brushed his thumb against the corner of her mouth, as if to smooth away the stress, but she only exhaled heavily through her nose and rolled her head in the other direction. He looked her over again, settling his thoughts, and gently pressed his fingers to her back, encouraging her to roll over even further. The mark on her hand was glowing, either reacting to her emotions or exacerbating them, he wasn’t entirely sure.

He slid under the blanket behind her shoulders, sitting with his back to the headboard, and very gently slid a hand into her hair, the other trailing down her arm to find her fingers, lacing into them as he let himself drift off to sleep, searching for her.

It wasn’t difficult to find her in the Fade, her cries of rage and pain echoing across the landscape: the courtyard of Skyhold.

He frowned, cautiously following the echoing screams up the stairs to the main hall. A glance toward his room showed that his murals were visible in oddly accurate detail. An important part of her dreamscape, evidently. He moved slowly, careful not to disturb his surroundings, and counted the paces. The hall seemed too long, too crowded, too oppressive. The air felt heavy. He wove through the assembled throngs of believers, sliding around and between half-formed people that seemed less like humanoid forms and more like thick sheets of wood carved into human silhouettes. He ducked under a noble’s false, rigid arm to slip into the ambassador’s office, frowning at the utterly ordinary-seeming room. This was the right direction, so where was...?

He glanced to the desk, then down the next hall. The door to the war room was open, and inside he could see the Inquisitor lying on the floor, curled on her side, as blood seeped out onto the flagstones.

Despite the internal reminder this was merely a figment of the Fade, merely her nightmare, his chest ached, his heart skipping on a battlefield panic he had only recently relearned. He hurried forward, struggling not to stumble over the rubble, strangely, faithfully replicated in her dreamscape.

The scene he found was grisly and ruinous, his gaze scanning the bizarre display. The Inquisition’s advisors stood like dolls over her, each holding a long, wet knife in one hand and chunks of her flesh in the other. Even Josephine, who was prone to squirm at the sight of so much as a _bandaged_ wound, was holding a piece that dripped blood and indeterminate, implausible gore. They were changed, their smiles twisted with a fiendish hunger that looked alien and awful on their faces.

“No,” the Inquisitor begged from the floor, her voice hoarse from screaming and cracking on a sob that was as painful to hear as it was uncharacteristic of her. "Please, take no more from me...”

Solas stepped forward, hesitant, but the advisors paid him no mind. He crouched and ran a hand through her hair. “Ma vhenan,” he murmured.

She flinched, but looked up at him, her eyes shining with tears that streaked through the blood smeared over her face. He brushed his knuckles over her cheek, his thumb wiping away a little of the blood and the tears, and she leaned into his touch.

“Come, let us dream of brighter things.”

“Dream...” she echoed, confused and small. As he helped her stand and walked away from the war room, she tangled her fingers into his and closed her eyes. As she came to understand, her wounds filled in with flesh, her skin unharmed, and the blood began to clear off her face, her agonized frown giving way to a small, cautious smile. “Wake me?” she murmured.

He hesitated, then smiled in turn. “Of course.”

He rose out of slumber and rubbed his thumb over her knuckles as she shook and inhaled sharply, awake. She turned to look at him over her shoulder, her nightmare-carved frown giving way to a small, sleepy smile.

“Mmm," she started, stopping for a brief yawn. "Not that I mind, but... why did you come?” she asked, sleep making her voice softer than usual, warm. She rubbed the hand he wasn’t holding captive across her face, and he smiled.

“And if I said your sleeping mind called out to mine?” he mused, the hand in her hair brushing it back behind her ear, which twitched at the touch. “It seems these dreams of yours have called me here, to bring some measure of peace to haunted sleep.”

She laughed softly and turned the rest of the way over, letting her arm fall over his stomach. “Then I am glad my _sleeping mind_ knows my heart better than I. Would you..." she paused, hesitating, and he rubbed his thumb over her knuckles again. "If you're willing," she started again. "Would you stay?”

“You have but to ask, ma vhenan,” he murmured, shifting down to lay beside her, and she lifted her hand out of the way until he settled again and let her rest her head against his chest. His hand fell back to her hair, stroking down its length to her shoulder. “Always, you have but to ask.”


End file.
